Wine

via beanscenemag.com

If there is one thing that surprised me most about our trip to Kelleris, it's that grapes really will grow anywhere.  When we think of vineyards, we picture the warmth and sun of California or southern France- never did I imagine that wine- good wine- could be made right here in Denmark.  At the same time though, grapes are picky.  The set-up we saw, with the meticulously spaced out plants, pruned to perfection, not a limb out of place, showed a far more labor intensive process than I had imagined.  And if I thought I didn't know much about the winemaking process, I just had to wait a few minutes to see how little I knew about the finished product.  Of the five wines we tasted, four of them tasted exactly the same to me.  Clearly, I still have a lot to learn.

Grape Vine
via leagueathletics.com

Wine was first brewed over 8,000 years ago in the Middle East, and quickly became a favorite worldwide.  In ancient Egypt, in 3000 BC, wine was widely adored and had both ritual and religious significance.  Ancient Greece, Rome, and China all too loved this drink, and devoted loads of time, energy, and mythology to it.  Wine was so well loved that it found its way into many religions; christianity sees wine as the blood of Christ, is blessed at Jewish ceremonies, and the Greeks added a god of wine and revelry, Dionysus, to their parthenon. Wine's popularity continued well into Medieval times, where it was drunk at nearly every meal by the merchant and noble classes.  During this period, wine was often watered down, and mixed with spices or honey to make it less alcoholic and more appetizing.

Today, wine is as popular as ever.  According to the wine institute, the US alone consumes nearly 900 million gallons of wine each year- and Americans are far from the most prolific drinkers of wine. Per capita, the French drink over nine times more wine than Americans.  The world wide wine industry is worth over 2.5 billion dollars.  Wine truly is a wonder drink.